Citywealth Leaders List, 60 seconds interview – Gordon Puckey, Phoenix Financial PR

Date: 05 Aug 2026

Karen Jones

This week’s 60 seconds Citywealth Leaders List interview is dedicated to Gordon Puckey, Founder and Managing Director at Phoenix Financial PR.

Tell Citywealth readers about your role and the brand/s you represent.

A few years ago now a good friend suggested I might rebrand myself, as a consigliere. Tom Hagen was without a shadow of a doubt one of my favourite characters in The Godfather, and what a job it would have been to be the most trusted confidant of Don Vito Corleone……. I just couldn’t get myself past the mafioso connotation. I think it would have looked pretty cool on a business card, but fear it may have frightened the hell out of any recipient!

Starting out in communications in the world of financial services with Streets Communications, one of the great agencies of its time, too many years ago now – and enjoying a broad-based multi-disciplinary training, long before digital marketing erased the clear demarcation lines that then defined advertising, direct marketing, sales promotion, public relations, investor relations and other areas – I chose public relations as my career path.

I have been a media relations consultant ever since, working to build and protect the reputation of numerous asset management and wealth management firms, and it has been an absolute privilege to have had the opportunity to work alongside some of our client partners for many years……our roster including some wonderful boutique firms, including Bordier UK, J. Stern & Co, KBI Global Investors and Zennor Asset Management.

What does a typical day look like for you?

As a media relations practitioner, it is unlikely any two days will ever bear any resemblance. You never know what you will wake to……..or to be more precise in a world of 24 hour news, what you will be woken to discuss!

We act as a press office for all of our clients. They pay us to manage their media profile and to build their brand – and whilst our work is for the most part proactive, delivering opportunities that will help to enhance a firm’s profile, it is also reactive. We receive countless media enquiries, but occasionally find ourselves working around crises, whether that’s responding to breaking news relating to the departure and/or defection of key personnel, a product default, a takeover bid……..or the most fun of all, at least for the PR, working with lawyers around incidences of media intrusion.

There is rarely a dull day in PR!

What recent campaign, rebrand or initiative are you most proud of?

Nearly four decades in, I really do still love what I do…………and I appreciate the opportunity I have to work with so many lovely and capable people……the great business leaders, the super talented asset managers, and the oh so creative marketeers.

We take great pride in our delivery for all of our clients, but have had a great deal of fun this year in particular promoting Bordier UK and J. Stern & Co. The former – with whom we have been working since 2010 – appointed a new CEO at the turn of 2025, bringing a new and more expansive approach to PR. Always mindful of the need to strike the right balance when promoting the London wealth management arm of a discrete Swiss private bank, Ian Heap’s appointment opened the door to showcasing a broader array of talent across the firm, and the opportunity to support the firm’s business development work across all target client groups. We’re on a mission, and we’re making tremendous headway.

Jérôme Stern…… a more decent man you will not meet in any walk of life…..appointed us in 2022, and we have relished the opportunity to help shape the J. Stern & Co. brand. As with Bordier, the firm leverages a rich history dating from the 19th century, championing an investment philosophy based on investing in quality for the long term, and an investment process based on its own analysis of stocks. Whether it has been telling the Stern family story, campaigning the flagship fund, supporting the work of new offices in Frankfurt and New York, or working with Board Member and Chair of Women in Football, Ebru Koksal around intergenerational wealth transfer, it continues to be a blast.

What are the biggest marketing challenges facing private wealth firms today?

I will leave someone far better qualified to bore on the way in which one should best leverage the opportunity that is AI…… challenge as that is. For me it is the everyday battle to differentiate your brand and your offering, which in a world where nothing is unique and homogeneity is the order of the day, presents the greatest challenge of all.

Drilling down on the core values of a business, agreeing upon and communicating a handful of key messages, defining how you want to be perceived in the minds of your target client ……. that is what builds brands and why PR plays a greater role than any other marketing discipline when it comes to setting yourself apart from your peers.

What metrics matter most to you when measuring success?

We only value what is easy to measure; that is the notion of the McNamara Fallacy, which originated from U.S. Secretary of Defence, Robert McNamara’s over-reliance on quantitative metrics during the Vietnam War. Focusing strictly on more easily measured data – the enemy body count for example – while ignoring unquantifiable human factors, McNamara’s strategy led to deeply flawed outcomes. Why? Because the most vital aspects of any organisation, indeed any business – its culture, its brand, its reputation, and the extent to which it is trusted – are nigh impossible to quantify.

We reject the McNamara Fallacy and are no great fans of quantitative assessment – indeed rail against metrics deployed in tracking or comparing our performance for PR is art over science, about creating a positive media backdrop and an environment in which our client partners are better placed to succeed……and focusing on the doing, rather than seeking to evaluate every action or outcome. Our clients instinctively know when we’re getting it right, placing the right stories in the right titles – they don’t need to put a number on it.

What do you consider to be the most important attributes for a marketing leader?

A creative mind is certainly helpful, and you need to be a team player, or at least capable of nurturing a team – but I see a fairly common thread running through good leaders. For me, you have to love what you do to inspire others – then it comes down to resilience and commitment, knowing that losing a pitch doesn’t mean you were second best, knowing when to roll with the punches and when to take a stand, firm in your belief that the strategy you are recommending is sound, wanting to get up and go again the next day. That’s what makes great leaders, what inspires, and why I find myself so disappointed with the attitude of so many young people and their sense of entitlement. We’ve all experienced anxiety, but I grew up watching my father rise early, cycle to the docks, come home and go straight to work on his vegetable plot – so I learnt from the outset that things rarely come easy.

Who or what inspires your creative thinking?

Without a shadow of a doubt, the younger of our two Tibetan terriers, Tux – so named by one of our three sons on account of him being completely black, bar his white bib. He’s a very handsome lad!

We are lucky to live in rural Suffolk, in great countryside, and a good walk not only helps with stress, it’s a time to clear the mind and the time I often get my best ideas.

I haven’t managed to convince my accountant just yet, but my new Scarpa boots are clearly tax deductible – n’est-ce pas?

Where was the last place you travelled for work or inspiration?

The wonderful city that is Valencia. I was introduced to the Spanish publishing and events business RankiaPro, which works exclusively with the asset management community, some five years ago now, and invited to experience their flagship Funds Experience Europe event.

I was invited to host the event’s gala Awards dinner the year after at the amazing Veles e Vents development and returned in June to host for a fourth consecutive year. I really must be far funnier than I had ever allowed myself to think! It’s an absolute privilege hosting this fabulous event, which with every passing year, feels more and more like a family gathering.

The first edition of the event brought together six asset management groups, around 50 attendees, from 10 European countries, with most delegates emanating from Spain. This year the event brought together 16 asset managers, with more than 125 fund selectors and investment professionals gathered, from 21 different countries – a truly international affair.

Hosted at the 5* Las Arenas Balneario Resort, on La Malvarrosa’s wonderful beachfront, it’s a truly inspiring event, and genuinely unique, seamlessly blending work and leisure. I can’t think of another occasion when I have discussed European funds regulation and the like with Latvians, Belgians, Swedes….. mojito in hand, in the pool…..or cooked paella in teams in the hotel gardens, under the watching eye of the hotel’s amazing chefs. Valencia is after all the home of paella!

Two of my clients bought into my recommendation and have since attended as sponsors!

If you were not in private wealth marketing, what would you be doing?

In my final year in Leicester, many moons ago now, the careers department asked me to complete a form – the Kuder Preference Record I believe – designed to identify you as one of numerous personality types, and suggest best career matches. My No.1 private sector match was PR, so kudos Kuder! My public sector match was rather more interesting, and something of a surprise; Kuder would have had me drumming the beat, yes, as a bobby!

Kuder’s private sector assessment wasn’t though so crazy as it is my interpersonal and communications skills which have underpinned a successful career in brand building and reputation management. Eventually too late to make the career change, it is nevertheless my advisory role with many asset management firms, and my continuing fascination with fund management, that leads me to believe I would have made for a very successful sales director. And I’d have made a sxxx load more money!

Asset management apart…..in another time, with all the freedom to choose, and as someone who as a young boy loved competing in cyclo-cross competitions, I would have been banging on the door of a professional road racing team. How I admire the athletes suffering five or six hours in the saddle, often in the heat and at altitude – and still capable of a respectable sprint at the end of it all. Happy to be Tadej’s domestique any day!

How do you relax after a busy campaign or event?

In a moment of quiet contemplation, and the company of a Provencal red. La Migoua, if you please, from Domaine Tempier……… the pilgrimage to Le Castellet one I finally completed with Mrs P only last year.

Which private wealth brand do you think is getting it right, and why?

Saving the trickiest question to last I see! I must go with Bordier, which rebranded just a couple of years ago.

An independent and privately-owned Swiss private bank, dedicated to private clients and their families around the world, it was established in 1844, so has truly stood the test of time. Offering banking services from offices around the world, the brand must work in multiple jurisdictions, with families, high net worth individuals and other client groups, in a world where discretion still matters.

In London, where Bordier operates as an asset manager, the client base is broader, Bordier UK’s clients including investment advisers and wealth planners, the private client introducer community, trustees and charities.

Is it a logo that brings it all together, and that gives the firm its highly differentiated positioning in the world of wealth management – no. It’s the values underpinning the brand – the personal liability for transactions of those at those at the helm, and the responsibility that brings. It’s Bordier & Cie’s absolute independence, which means the firm doesn’t have to answer to shareholders or analysts. And it’s the consistent manner in which these values have been communicated to clients through the years.

As the client likes to say, ‘Not for sale, never has been, never will be.’ Now that’s a brand.

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